_Mr. Punch to Toby._
_I_ am the only Painter without bias,
And Monster Panoramas, my TOBIAS,
Now being quite the order of the day,
I've limned the largest, which I here display;
And, issued in mine Almanack, 'tis clear
'Twill be the Biggest Order of the Year!
'Tis painted in the Highest Art Style--Mine!
Here you perceive the pith of 'Eighty-Nine,
A Year of Grace--and also of disgraces.
Look, TOBY, on this sea of well-known faces!
Mark the familiar eyes, the salient noses!
(The sign of GLADSTONE or the mark of MOSES.)
Kings, Lords and Ladies, Statesmen, Whigs and Tories.
No painter of great sprawling Allegories
Ever yet packed into so small a compass
So many who've won fame--or raised a rumpus.
A _précis_ of a twelvemonth's work and babble is
This summary of the great _Annus Mirabilis_.
Perpend, TOBIAS. Hand me up the pointer.
Listen, O World! and, Time, thou great disjointer
Of hearts and epochs, stand awhile at gaze,
Whilst I explore, explain the Mighty Maze,
Which, being made by _Punch_, the Friend of Man,
You may depend is "not without a plan."
Now for the rostrum! Follow my pointer, TOBY, with thy recording
pencil. Listen, O World, with ears attent, and eyes "sequacious of
the--Truth-teller!" I speak _urbi et orbi!_
First, the newly-elected County Council, Ladies and Gentlemen!
RITCHIE'S colossal Civic Symposium! "RITCHIE'S Folly," some hasty
assayers of innovations may have been tempted to term it. But _Punch_
is never hasty.
_Macbeth_ at the Lyceum and GLADSTONE in Naples! Later on, "Macbeth"
IRVING visits the QUEEN--an honoured guest! The return of the dove--if
the Brummagem Bruiser may be likened to the Bird of Peace. All, at any
rate, welcome his wife, a true messenger of peace, let us hope, from
across the Atlantic flood.
From West to NORTH--the "Nitrate King." Let us trust he'll prove a
"True North" to the multitudes who trust _him_. Next the Teuton Titan
on the (Colonial) War-Path! Formidable competitor; but even Titans
trip at times, eh, Orion? From BISMARCK asking for Samoa to CHAPLIN
"chucking" Protection _is_ a transit. Big 'uns both--of a sort? But
BOULANGER, the pseudo-great General Boum, coming a cropper? _Guarda, e
passa!_
The ingenious Japs at a new work of Art--scarcely native this time.
We'll hope their "New Constitution" may shape as well as their
cabinets, and wear better than their locks and keys. Pantomime
child-peris turned out--_pro tem._, thanks be--of their Stage
Paradise. "See me reverse!"
Two openings,--Parliament and the Parnell Commission. And
then--sinister sequel to the latter!--the flight of the pitiful
PIGOTT. A far pleasanter picture is the return of generous D'AUMALE to
Chantilly. Scarcely less agreeable, to lovers of peace and of France,
is the flight of the blatant firebrand BOULANGER. Welcome the coming,
speed the parting guest!
Big brave boys these American Base-Ball players. Game _may_ be
acclimatised here, but _they_ evidently thought our "climate" against
them, and with reason. Loss of the _Sultan_,--_not_ the PADISHAH
himself, worse luck! He would be _no_ loss. Cambridge winning "the
classic race"! Bravo, Light Blue! Who mutters demur! Ah! you are a
brunette, though a "fair" one, my dear, so _Punch_ pardons you. The
sight of your Gracious QUEEN enjoying her Royal self in Portugal,
will, perhaps, put you in a better temper, Miss.
Two bad endings! Abolition of the Board of Works, and abdication
of King MILAN of Servia. Both can be well spared. But BRIGHT, brave
belligerent JOHN, true, tenacious, trenchant,--no, we could ill spare
_him_. What, _Punch_ wonders, would the fighting Apostle of Peace
have said of the "Naval Defence Bill" hard by? Well, we know what
the Country said of it. And the escape of that Kane-Captained
Rennie-engined _Calliope_,--England has not forgotten that yet, if the
Admiralty has.
Opening of the Great--the Colossal, the Titanic, the World-witching,
Republic-saving French Exhibition! As "Big" a thing as--as the Tour
Eiffel itself! Can even _Mr. Punch_ say more? It must have a paragraph
all to itself. Well done, LUTETIA! Well may you _pro tem._ at least,
kick out politics.
SANDY "takes the floor," and his "Scotch Local Government Bill!" Hope
he'll like it. He generally does like big things, be they Bills or
Cabers! Better anyhow than PADDY relishes "BALFOUR'S Battering-Ram,"
which comes next. And then, Gentlemen, the match at Brummagem between
those two political pugilists, CHURCHILL and CHAMBERLAIN! Fight
unfinished, result as yet uncertain. National Portrait Gallery to
be fitly housed at last. Then the picture takes us "across the
herring-pond" to the great Washington Centenary. Four Millions more
money for Ships, the opening of the Opera Season, the raising of the
Rates; all matters of interest, painful or otherwise, to most of you,
Gentlemen.
Abandonment of the Sugar Bill! Not one of the much-talked-of "sweets
of office" this, eh? Ask BARON DE WORMS! Raid on the Betting Clubs!
But the great Demon of Gambling, like the objects of the great Curse
in Ingoldsby, "never" seems "one penny the worse." Opening of the
Spanish Exhibition. Equipment of our Volunteers. Bravo, Lord Mayor
WHITEHEAD!
The Johnstown Floods, Gentlemen; too terrible to talk lightly of.
Here is symbolised the discreditable Parachute Mania, which was a
disagreeable feature of the dead year. May it die therewith! I hear a
stir, a silken amongst my fair auditors. Yes, Ladies, the Marriage of
the lucky Duke of PORTLAND, lucky, as I said at the time, with both
Bridal and Bridle. Another Dropped Bill, Gentlemen; this time the Land
Transfer Bill, "knocked out" in the Lords by the "Sluggers" of Legal
Privilege. Westward Ho! goes the ubiquitous, inexhaustible G. O. M. on
party thoughts intent; whilst near him is shadowed forth the rise
of that Irreconcileable, Socialistic new "Fourth Party," the avowed
purposes of which probably sometimes "give him pause."
Great Show of the "Humorists in Art." Hope you all went to see it. If
you didn't, 'twas your loss. Then--strange juxtaposition!--the Great
Turf Libel Case! _Can_ one "libel" the Turf? _Mr. Punch_ wonders.
Anyhow, "Donovan"--that Lucky Duke again!--wins the Derby. "Donovan"
was evidently "on the job," not "out for an airing," eh? Visit of the
SHAH of Persia. You will not want me to say anything more about that
threshed-out subject. The Labour Congress in Switzerland was less
talked of, but probably quite as important, whilst the appointment
of Her Most Gracious MAJESTY as President of the Royal Agricultural
Society is of even greater home-interest.
Next comes the Great Event of the Year! _Mr. Punch's_ Visit to the
Paris Exhibition, already celebrated by him in proper time and shape!
You all of you have its record, of course. If not--get it!!! That
Balloon bore a happy party, and needed no parachute.
The Delagoa Bay Railway business, _Mr. Punch's_ pictorial comment on
which so infuriated mischievous Master PORTUGAL! The Whitechapel Woe!
Not a matter for words, Gentlemen, but deeds.
Hooray! Another Royal Marriage! The Wedding March, with a FIFE
accompaniment! And--quite "in a concatenation accordingly," though at
t'other side of Panorama--the Golden Wedding of the G. O. M. Prospect
and retrospect, both pleasant. Was it the tender association of
sympathy which made the G. O. M. so eloquent in favour of the Royal
Grants? Who knows? Anyhow, his more rampant "followers"--LABBY among
them--would have liked, for the moment, to "muzzle" the "old man
eloquent"--as MONRO did the London dogs. The Naval Review, and the
German Emperor's brief visit, "synchronised," as the saps say;
and _then_, as another "Big Thing," they made CHAPLIN Minister of
Agriculture! "Capping the Climax," that! Hard-by another Great--or
Big--Man, hews away at the Tithes Bill. Go it, HARCOURT!
Following the example of another _really_ Great Man, Mr. GLADSTONE
goes to Paris, sees the Exhibition, mounts the Eiffel Tower, perorates
pleasantly about the Two Republics, France and America. Or should we
say, America and France? _Arcades ambo?_ And the G. O. M. orating on
them was _very_ Arcadian indeed.
The miserable Maybrick Case calls for no comment here. The Great
Strike does. Memorable event, Ladies and Gentlemen, which--as Truthful
THOMAS would say--"will have results." Ecclesiastical dress for ladies
_may_ interest the more "dressy" portion of my audience--or may not.
The French Elections. _Mr. Punch_ congratulates _Madame La République_
whom primarily the Exhibitors, and secondarily the Urns, saved from
chaos and General Boum-BOULANGER! BALFOUR'S little _faux pas_,
in connection with an Irish University. _That_ fish won't
bite! "OUTIDANOS" on the Triple Alliance! Outis--the Ulysses of
Liberalism--defying the huge Polyphemus of Continental Despotism. So
perhaps he, the Homer-lover, would picture it. Polyphemus may have a
different opinion, perchance.
Railways in China! Ah! _Mr. Punch_ thinks he has heard of _that_
before. He hopes it may be true this time; though, to the Mandarin,
the Locomotive is a Bogey, and the Line sacrilege. Arab advance on
Suakin! Neither is _that_ a novel item of news! Gallantly repelled
this time, though, and partly, at least, by native valour. A good
omen!
Trials at Maryborough, consequent on the lamentable Gweedore
evictions, and yet more lamentable crime attending them. When will
_this_ sort of thing be wiped out of the panorama of the year?
Raid of the egregious MCDOUGALL, compound, apparently, of _Bottom_ and
_Paul Pry_. Well, all's well that ends well, eh, "Mister" ROSEBERY?
Glad, anyhow, _you_ are to boss the London County Council yet a little
longer. You may be counted on to minimise the MCDOUGALL element.
Greek Royal Wedding. Rare year this for what may be called Splendid
Splices! Royal Princes, Princesses, and lucky Dukes well to the fore!
As a set-off--alas!--_Mr. Punch's_ Panorama has reluctantly, and
delicately, to record many lamented deceases of great, or worthy, or
well-beloved ones. Poor Crown Prince RUDOLPH, stout and eloquent JOHN
BRIGHT, quaint and clever PELLEGRINI, the _Vanity Fair_ Caricaturist,
Lady HOLLAND, of politico-social fame, WILKIE COLLINS, the master of
ingeniously Sensational Romance; and last, but, to _Mr. Punch_ and
his young men certainly not least, PERCIVAL LEIGH, of _Comic Latin
Grammar_, and _Mr. Pips's Diary_ fame--to the world, and, to his
private friends, "dear old Professor," of pleasant and unfading
memory.
Royal Globe-trotters again? The German Emperor visits Constantinople,
and hob-nobs with the SULTAN; the Prince of WALES is off to Egypt,
where, perhaps, he hob-nobs with Father Nile. Thence returning,
_Punch_ hopes, happy, and with renewed stores of sturdy health!
Yet later in the year come two Big Shows, the Lord Mayor's to wit,
with pretty reproductions of old English dresses and disportings, and
that of the evergreen P. T. BARNUM, with--well--with everything in the
marvel line, if _Mr. Punch_ may trust PHINEAS'S posters.
The Public, anyhow, may trust _Mr. Punch's!_ By such a Panoramic
Poster even the Great Showman will admit himself outdone.
That is all, Ladies and Gentlemen, for the present. _Mr. Punch_, in
conclusion, wishes you all a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year!
* * * * *
[Illustration]
On 22nd of February Session opened; date unusually late, but then
remember our Autumn Session of previous year brought us up to
Christmas Eve. CHARLES LAMB, arriving at office late in the morning,
pleaded that he made up for it by going away early. House, going
away late, returns little later. Very modest Ministerial Programme to
commence with. How it has been carried out has been told from day
to day with graphic minuteness and uncompromising fidelity by _Mr.
Punch's_ humble, but respected companion. "The Diary of TOBY, M.P.,"
follows the British flag. It is read everywhere--by the pathless
ice-floes of Canada, through the length of North and South America,
in the cities of Australia, by the watch-fires of the Squatters, on
Greenland's icy mountains, and eke on India's coral strand; where
_Punch_ appears weekly on the bookstalls, price threepence. It will,
therefore, not be necessary to go much into detail, a brief summary
sufficing.
At the outset GEORGIE HAMILTON promises Bill to strengthen Navy;
LORD ADVOCATE mentions Scotch Universities Bill, with Scotch
Local Government Bill to follow. PARNELL puts in early appearance,
challenging BALFOUR, amid wild cheers from Irish Members, to explain
why CAREW, M.P., at present in prison, had been deprived not only of
his flannel shirt, but of his hair and moustache?
Debate on Address turns largely on Irish affairs. Suddenly, in full
tide of attack, comes news of flight of PIGOTT. For awhile PIGOTT'S
presence fills the place; his name thrown at BALFOUR whenever he
rises; cries of "PIGOTT!" punctuate Ministerial replies. Nevertheless,
JOHN MORLEY'S Amendment to Address negatived by 339 votes against 260;
Address being finally carried without a division.
GEORGIE HAMILTON got on early with his scheme for strengthening the
Navy. Twenty-one-and-a-half millions asked for, adding seventy ships
to British Navy. Not all to be built at once; whole scheme to be
accomplished by April, 1894. Bill, debated three several nights,
finally passed. In accordance with pledge given last Session, Supply
put in fore-front of business. House sat night after night, sometimes
voting money, always talking. All kinds of questions came up in
Supply; treatment of Irish prisoners; Ministers' alleged connivance
with _Times_; above all, PIGOTT, by this time, huddled up in suicide's
grave at Madrid. Special attack made on ATTORNEY-GENERAL for his
professional connection with the _Times_ case. HARCOURT led attack,
CHARLES RUSSELL taking notable part in it. But his friends stuck to
him through thick and thin, and Vote of Censure defeated by large
majority.
On 28th of March, came news of death of JOHN BRIGHT; fell like oil on
troubled waters. OLD MORALITY bore testimony to his worth. GLADSTONE
pronounced a splendid eulogy; HARTINGTON added a postscript; JUSTIN
M'CARTHY spoke for Ireland; and CHAMBERLAIN, rising to height of
occasion, informed the House, that Birmingham had never allowed the
Statesman they mourned to pay any of the subscriptions ordinarily
exacted from a Borough Member. Thereafter the House went on with its
ordinary business.
On 16th of April, GOSCHEN introduced Budget in smallest House gathered
in similar circumstances for many years. Both ends made to meet by
increase of Death Duties, and a little tinkering of the Malt Duty.
About this time, the "NOBLE BARON," began to loom on horizon with
his Sugar Bounties Convention. Much time wasted through remainder of
Session over this matter. Government stood gallantly by "NOBLE
BARON;" in the end, amid the jeers of Opposition, Sugar Bounties Bill
withdrawn to avoid Ministerial defeat.
On 14th of May, OLD MORALITY brought in Bill to establish Board of
Agriculture for Great Britain, a measure which, happily passing, has
dowered the country with CHAPLIN as Minister of Agriculture.
Early in July, came on proposal to make provision for eldest Son of
PRINCE OF WALES. Manifestations of opposition induced Government
to present the matter in modified form of Motion for appointment
of Select Committee to consider the whole question of provision for
Members of Royal Family. This agreed to, after debate, in which SAGE
of QUEEN ANNE'S GATE came to the front, keeping his place throughout
subsequent proceedings. Great efforts made to buy off opposition of
this incorruptible person; hesitated for brief moment, when position
of Treasurer of Her Majesty's Household dangled before his eyes.
Principal public duty of Treasurer, is to bring in gracious replies
from the Throne to Addresses from faithful Commons. In his mind's
eye, SAGE saw himself in Windsor uniform, with gold stripe adown
trouser-leg, leaning lightly on white wand of office, as he stood
at the Bar of the House awaiting the SPEAKER'S signal to bring up
gracious reply. For a moment he faltered, but only for a moment. "No,"
he said, "England expects every man to do his duty, and LABBY will not
disappoint expectation;" and he went straight off and put down
five fresh Amendments. This, now published for the first time, is
authentic.
These debates on the Royal Grants were, perhaps, the most animated
of Session. Vote for Royal Family of course granted, but in face of
significant minority of 116. GLADSTONE supported Government, marching
into Lobby against large majority of his own following, who turned
aside with the Incorruptible SAGE. Oddest thing of all was to behold
Irish Members voting with the Court Party--JOSEPH GILLIS going out
shoulder to shoulder with ARTHUR BALFOUR, and TAY PAY hobnobbing with
OLD MORALITY.
After this the Session languished. OLD MORALITY expedited business
by announcing that no fresh measures of importance would be taken.
Members began to clear out, and early close of Session seemed
imminent. But, towards end of July, when everybody thought business
would be wound up, the Tithes Bill brought in, and stubbornly pressed.
A difficult position for the Government. Bill hotly opposed by
Liberals, and not loved by Conservatives. GRAY, Conservative Member
for Maldon, moved crucial Amendment, which was negatived only by
critical majority of four in a House of 286 Members. Nevertheless
Government still stuck to framework of Bill. ATTORNEY-GENERAL tabled
batch of Amendments which transmogrified the Measure. On 16th of
August House faced by practically new Bill. This made matters no
better. Liberals mollified, Conservatives angry. Next day, amid storm
of jeering, borne with characteristic calmness by OLD MORALITY, he
withdrew the Measure.
After this it was all over, even the shouting, and on the very last
day of August the Session of 1889 came to a close. Its final hours,
otherwise peaceful, were fluttered by promise of a Measure endowing
an Irish University, whereat there was much spluttering in political
circles.
* * * * *